Classic TV

Garbage Pail Kids

The way things usually work is like this: first comes a blockbuster movie, and then comes an avalanche of merchandise. For the Garbage Pail Kids, however, it’s sort of in reverse. First came the really cool stickers, and the came the, errr, movie.

To be perfectly honest I think the movie definitely belongs in the garbage pail. Don’t get me wrong, some people may think it’s an excellent film, but I’m afraid the law of comparison comes into play here. In one hand we have your run-of-the-mill film, and then on the other hand you have the expression on your parents face when they find out that you’ve stuck you entire Garbage Pail Kid collection to the back of your bedroom door. Do you see my point here? There’s absolutely no contest.

If you were living in a dustbin while the Garbage Pail Kids craze was going on, then obviously you won’t have a clue what all malarkey is all about. Basically, imagine the football stickers you used to be able to get. Next, imagine the Cabbage Patch Kids craze that those loopy yanks are now famous for. Take the idea of the sweet and innocent Cabbage Patch Kids and make them into the most gross characters you can think of. Then finally slap them onto stickers, give them to kids, let them swap them for a while, add the urge to stick them to the back of your bedroom door, bring parents to the boil and simmer for about 2 weeks (or until a new bedroom door can be bought. Believe me, those stickers do not peel off easily).

The thing we have here is a craze about stickers with gross characters on them. It therefore follows that the movie spin-off itself should be as gross as possible. That’s what you would have thought isn’t it. Let’s just say that the tag-line of the film goes something like “out of the garbage pail, into your hearts”. Nuff said.

Me thinks that someone needs to be beaten with a clue stick. Garbage Pail Kids primarily appealed to the young males of the human species, due to the fact that at that age most of them looked like the Garbage Pail Kids anyway. If you then make a movie that’s basically a chick-flick, then it ain’t gonna work.